"The dildo will emit an ultrasonic pulse and the spider will then run as fast as it can for the nearest available exit."

She added: "The woman can then return to pleasuring herself by candlelight while eating a big bowl of chocolate buttons and reading about the fat parts of all the celebrities she watches on Living TV."

News of the breakthrough has led to a wave of nostalgia among women for the men they will soon be chasing down the garden path with one of their own golf clubs.

Emma Bradford, from Peterborough, said: "I think what I'll miss most is being spoken to like a child by someone who thinks he's the cleverest person in the world because he read the answers to all the Trivial Pursuit questions when he was 15."

Jane Gerving, from Hatfield, said: "I'll miss living with the funniest man in the universe. He's just so very fucking funny. All the time."